1. Technical Field
The following embodiments generally relate to a distributed file system and a method for configuring and operating the distributed file system. More particularly, the following embodiments relate to a distributed file system that uses a torus network and a method for configuring and operating the distributed file system that uses the torus network.
2. Description of the Related Art
The requirements for configuring a server cluster are as follows:
1) minimize the communication bottleneck between servers, and
2) guarantee the availability of a communication channel.
In order to satisfy these requirements, a conventional network configuration, for example, a fat-tree network topology comprising multiple levels of switches, may be used. However, when the conventional network configuration is used, network costs increase exponentially as the scale of the cluster increases.
In order to solve this problem, a method for communication between server nodes themselves, that is, a method for configuring a torus network using network interface cards (NIC) in servers, has been proposed.
This method may satisfy the above-mentioned requirements merely by adding NICs to servers without additional network construction costs even if the number of servers increases.
Meanwhile, a distributed file system comprises multiple data servers, as in the case of a server cluster. Here, the data servers operate as nodes for the distributed file system. Also, the distributed file system processes data service requests from a user through systematic cooperation between the data servers. Data service requests include requests for creating a file, searching for a file, reading data, writing data, and the like. However, similar to the above-mentioned problem of a server cluster, as the scale of the file system increases, network construction costs, required to connect servers in order to configure a large-scale data server cluster, sharply increase.
However, in solving the above-mentioned problem, a distributed file system may not be effectively configured using an existing torus network, unlike a simple server cluster. Accordingly, when a torus network is applied to a large-scale distributed file system, it is necessary to consider the following characteristics.
1) Data service requests are received from a public network, and the responses to the requests are also sent via the public network.
2) Generally, the frequency with which old data are accessed decreases with increasing time since the data were created.
3) User data accumulate with time.
4) Accessing some data has a high proportion of data service.
For the management of a distributed file system, a variety of research and development is in progress. For example, with regard to the management of a distributed file system, Korean Patent Application Publication No. 2014-0060959 is disclosed. Also, with regard to the operation of a torus network, Korean Patent No. 1318426 is proposed.